Purpose of the present invention is creating a delivering plug with automatic opening with a “tamper evident” system which is completely made of plastic material (therefore, easily recyclable) and which can be adapted to containers already present on the market, actually replacing the currently marketed old plug versions.
Especially, a specific integration is required, both at aesthetic level, and as management of the plug inside the manufacturing cycle, regarding the container for soy sauce marketed by company Kikkoman, which, several years ago, launched on the market a container which would have become a “guide” and leader of all other soy producers, with sales of more than 300 millions of pieces since its creation in 1961. The plug of the invention, therefore, is integrated without damaging/changing the aesthetic level of the above Kikkoman dispenser.
The present invention will therefore be described as example of integration/adaptation of the new concept of delivering plug to the Kikkoman soy dispenser, since this is the most complex example to make, because one has to integrate a new concept to an existing system. Such solution however will be only an example, but will not be a limitation of the inventive concept of the present application.
Such inventive concept can be adapted to any type of container/product existing on the market.
Therefore, as regards the plug manufactured and marketed by the company Kikkoman, with reference to FIGS. 16, 17 and 18, it has an operating/actuation principle of this type by the end user at its first opening:
Step 1: removing the external heat-shrinkable sleeve (not shown) which covers the whole plug;
Step 2: removing the plug 0.1;
Step 3: removing the plug 0.5, which is the main seal during transport and storage;
Step 4: checking for the presence of the OR-ring 0.6;
Step 5: re-screwing the plug onto the bottle and using it.
Such plug which, observing FIG. 16, is formed of five pieces (external heat shrinkable sleeve, upper plug 0.1, main body 0.3, washer/OR-ring 0.6 and lower sealing plug 0.5) however has some defects:
it is a very costly plug formed of several parts/pieces;
as regards the molding cost, some parts like the main body 0.3 are geometrically over-dimensioned as regards the level of used plastic: in practice, the piece can be enlightened (and it is what occurs in the delivering plug of the present invention) in order to optimize the weight and, consequently, having less plastics, also its production cycle, with a very quick and therefore less costly injection molding;
consequently, it has a very high production and assembly cost;
the presence and the need of having an external heat shrinkable sleeve is the only warranty of not opening and not counterfeiting the product, only at its first opening; moreover, the sleeve must be applied afterwards, after having filled the bottle and screwed the plug. This additional step complicates and slows down the production process;
moreover, the sleeve, once removed, will have to be dispensed of with a further operation required for the end customer/user.
The plug produced and marketed by company Kikkoman is not easily used and not immediately understood, due to the multiple assembled parts to guarantee its seal.
The plug, before its use (first use) must be prepared. For a better understanding, to start delivering the product, it is necessary to unscrew the plug and remove the part 0.5 (FIGS. 16, 17 and 18).
Also in this case, the end user is requested to perform an additional operation for managing the disposal of the removed plug.
Sometimes, removing the plug, which is a necessary operation during the first use, the washer/OR-ring 0.6 is lost, and therefore the plug, once being screwed again onto the bottle, not having the intermediate sealing element 0.6 anymore, will cause liquid leakages between bottle and remaining plug assembly.
Moreover, it will be possible to re-use the container by filling it again with a counterfeited liquid without any guarantee of genuineness for the end user.
Such plugs have no real warranty seals capable of pointing out a counterfeiting or a simple opening, but only a small “dust preventing” plug, whose purpose is protecting the product contained in the bottle from dust or dirt. Currently, therefore, there is no warranty (apart from the first use, since there is the heat shrinkable sleeve) against counterfeiting the product contained in the bottle, because the small plug can be easily removed and re-inserted without the end user becoming aware of this: therefore, counterfeited products can be distributed without any problem and above all without an awareness of the end user.
Documents US-A1-2007/181615, U.S. Pat. No. 5,299,718, US-A1-2009/250461 and US-A1-2011/174842 disclose containers of liquids equipped with plugs according to the preamble of claim 1.